


Calls

by Shatteeran



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: 6b never happened, Angst, Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Spoilers, Canon Compliant, Depression, F/M, Grief/Mourning, I Blame Verdi, M/M, Phone Calls & Telephones, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, So Much Grief, So much angst, Up to 6A, What Have I Done, and tumblr, maybe? - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-15
Updated: 2018-07-15
Packaged: 2019-06-10 14:15:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15293328
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shatteeran/pseuds/Shatteeran
Summary: One forsaken night, Scott McCall's Pack deals with the consequences of the events unfolding in Marvel's Avengers: Infinity War (Part I)... and things will never be the same.





	Calls

**Author's Note:**

> Survival Guide To Enjoy Whatever This Is (maybe): 
> 
> 1 - Beware of spoilers! This is based on Marvel's Avengers Infinity War (Part I) movie ending! If you haven't seen it and want to, don't read. Really... You've been advised. (If you don't want to see it anyways, you don't need to have seen it to understand the plot: it is fairly simple.)
> 
> 2 - Take care of yourself! I tried to be as clear as I could in the tags but this work may be triggering (I'm not sure: it is the saddest thing I've ever written). More details on the End Notes.
> 
> 3 - Be truthful! I spent hours on this instead of working on other projects. I couldn't stop until it was written, edited and posted. Yet I absolutely loathe the end result. If you do too, reader, that's fine, give up and move along. These things happen...

_It starts with a scream…_

 

_Quantico – 1:47 a.m. (EST)_

“Stiles?”, the trembling voice on the phone wavers, barely covering the strange static on the line. It sounds like the shrilling echo of a supernatural shout. Reverberating on every surface the wave touches.

Her tone holds a begging quality that no one should ever get to hear coming from Lydia Martin. Mieczyslaw ‘Stiles’ Stilinski frowns. He glances at the clock on the wall of his bedroom. The needles only serve to increase the dread already cooling on his spine. Though he is usually awake, his girlfriend never calls this late.

“It’s everyone, Stiles”, she says. “So many… so many… Gone.”

In the background, the FBI student can pick up sounds of commotions and agitation.

“Lydia, it’s okay, you’re okay”, he attempts to reassure her, but his own stress is giving him away. “Do you want me to come? Let me pick up my keys and… Talk to me! Tell me what’s going on?”

“No… it’s… it’s everywhere”, she inhales loudly, and he realizes she’s been crying. His mind viciously takes him to the last time he saw her tears. Swallowing down his regrets hurts his throat. “It’s everyone”, she tries again, and her next words are wracked with sobs.

“Let me call Scott!”, Stiles reasons. “It’s still early for them. Maybe they can figure out what’s going on, okay?”

“Stiles, don’t hang up”, she pleads, her breathing labored. “Don’t leave me. Stay… I need to… I need to… here.”

“I need to get the call chain going, Lyds.”, Stiles argues, soft and caring, in the soothing and awed inflexion he only finds with her. “The sooner the others know, the sooner they can figure it out.”

“No, Stiles, don’t leave me…”, she repeats, like a broken record. “You don’t understand…”

“I’ll call you right back”, Stiles promises, his hand automatically brushing his hair until his fingers reach his nape. He thought he had grown out of this nervous habit long ago.

“Please, Stiles…”, she tries one more time. “Listen to me…”

“I love you”, he throws guiltily before he moves his phone away from his ear to hang up.

He still has the time to catch her last words: “It’s too late.”

 

_London – 6:47 a.m. (BST)_

Jackson Whittemore’s blue eyes blink open. He snuggles back against the body lying next to him, finding comfort in the warmth and scent of his mate.

“Jax”, Ethan whispers again, pulling him out of his slumber.

The kanima playfully growls, a wordless manner to ask the redhead in his bed to give him ten more minutes. He hears more than he sees the smile his reaction inspired.

“Sorry to wake you up”, Ethan apologizes as if he had followed his lover’s trail of thoughts. Jackson rumbles contentedly.

Chasing his dreams away, he takes the view in: Ethan is propped on his elbow, their purple sheets pooled around his waist. Jackson thinks maybe his boyfriend can make it worth waking him up.

“I just wanted to say I love you”, Ethan murmurs with a sad smile. His index finger traces the shape of Jackson’s ear. “And also, try to listen from time to time, okay?”

The kanima wants to ask what brought this on. But his befuddled mind cannot formulate the question… Ethan’s body disintegrates in front of him. Small piece by small piece, the love of his life turns into volatile dust. The powder catches and reflects the light of the moon as it flies away by the open window.

Jackson blinks. His mouth hangs open, the expression of stupor ridiculing his face. He blinks. Turns his head back to the mattress, half-expecting the vision to be the hallucination of a dissipating nightmare. The empty bed puzzles him. Horror only takes hold of him when his palm touches the lukewarm sheets.

 

_Davis – 10:49 p.m. (PST)_

A loving smile creeps up on Scott McCall’s crooked jaw. He softly caresses the cheek of the girl asleep in his arms: Malia still has trouble keeping up with _House of Cards,_ but she insists he doesn’t watch a single episode without her anyways. Scott doesn’t have the heart to tell her he is watching this season for the third time because she never makes it to the end of an episode.

His phone buzzes against his pocket and he is thankful his lover is tucked against his other side. He quite enjoys the weight of her head against his chest. He lets the call go to voicemail… but his phone is still vibrating, and the True Alpha werewolf immediately understands that he is getting called a second time. He cannot really escape his responsibilities. His beta coyote stirs in her sleep.

“This is Scott.”

“Scotty”, Stiles speaks urgently. “Something happened... Lydia called. Something happened… is happening.”

“Alright, alright, calm down. Something supernatural?”, the Alpha asks, slowed down by his own sleepiness. He must have dozed off more than he thought.

“No, thank god!”, his best friend snarks. “Something perfectly natural. This is a courtesy call in the middle of the night.”

Scott learned from years of dealing with Stiles that he wears sarcasm as an armure. And because he is a good leader and great friend, he ignores it in favor of asking:

“What’s going on?”

To his regret, Malia sits up on their ratty green couch, an interrogative look in her brown eyes. Scott is overwhelmed with the need to kiss her and hold her close and he knows in his bones something is very wrong.

“I don’t know, man”, Stiles answers, subdued. “Lydia rang me. She was crying. And now there is yelling about people disappearing…”

“In your dorm?”

“In the streets”, Stiles lets out. “Something is seriously messed up.”

“I feel it too”, Scott confirms. He gets up, can feel Malia’s stare tracking his movements in the penumbra. She is listening in, he realizes. Scott silently holds out his hand to her. She slowly gets up to take it into her own.

“Scott…”, Stiles starts again, his voice fully drowned in worry. “She said it’s every _one_ every _where_ … Scott, I…”

“Call your dad, I’ll call my mom and Chris.”, the Alpha orders, taking charge. “Malia and I will take care of the Pack”, he adds. “Go meet Lydia. If someone can figure it out, it’s the both of you.”

Stiles hangs up without another word.

 

_North Carolina – 1:53 a.m. (EST)_

Derek Hale grins at his baby sister Cora’s blush.

“Seriously, though”, he reiterates to his screen, his eyebrow pulled fiercely together in his trademark intimidation tactic. “When do I get to meet this boyfriend of yours? At least on Skype”, he amends quickly. He is not ready for Cora’s love life to put emotional distance between the two of them. He already is having a hard time dealing with their geographical one as it is.

But his sister has made her home in South America. And if anyone can grasp the importance of the concept of home…  the roaming omega wolf forces another smile for her benefit.

“How are you, Der? Really?”, she brusquely asks, tactless and to-the-point as ever.

“I’m at peace”, he replies. Then he repeats it, because the image froze, and the connectivity problems button has lit up on the app. And he says it again, because on the next spotty frame, his sister is not looking at the camera.

“Should we turn off the video or something?”, he proposes.

The image quality increases back to default levels. She faces him once more, but her entire demeanor has changed. She plants her wide-open eyes in his. He is aware of the artificiality of the stare-down, but the sudden intensity strikes him. He watches with puzzlement as the yellow gold invades her irises.

“I need you to promise me, Der”, she enunciates with a far-away voice. Shivers run on his limbs and back. Death dances in the recess of his mind. “Promise me, that you will not make this about you. This is not your fault. Promise me you will be happy, my brother!”

“Cora, what are you… ?”, Derek starts, but his interrogation is soon replaced by a yell and a supplication. “No! No no no no no no no… Cora! Stay with me. Look at me… Cora, you… No.”

She remains silent after that, her expression guarded and fixed in a calm smile. She stares at the camera with all the affection she can muster while her brother watches her turn into nothingness on the grainy screen. He cannot even distinguish the dust he believes she left behind on the poor resolution.

“Promise me…”, he hears again, unable to tell whether the plea comes from her soul, delayed audio or his own imagination.

The last survivor of the Hale fire succumbed. The ache in the pit of Derek’s stomach temporarily blinds him. He bends over to retch. His entire family… He has lost everyone. The world is in black and white when his vision returns. The pain obliterates any beginning of thought. Alone. Dead. Alone. The adjectives resound in his head like a nefarious litany. He cannot breathe. He finds he does not care. Dead. Alone. Dead. A ton-worth of sorrow and guilt is crushing his ribcage. He welcomes the first cracking noise with thankfulness. He barely feels the agony of the shift taking over. Alone. Dead. Alone. His clawed hands smash his laptop against the ground when he gets on all four. Dead. Alone. A wolf howls. Dead.

 

_London – 6:53 a.m. (BST)_

Jackson’s entire attention focuses on the iPhone X in his clammy hand. ‘Danny Mahealani’ reads on the black screen. His eyes are red-rimmed, and he cannot stop shuddering. He refuses to look behind him to be certain, but from the movement on his hips, he can tell his tail is out and aggressively balancing around the bedframe. He does not want to think about the remainder of his days as a mindless killer monster. Ethan is all that matters. Saving Ethan deserves all his energy. The second the mention under Danny’s name switches from ‘calling…’ to the traditional ticker, the kanima jumps out of bed, presses the device to his ear and starts pacing.

“Danny! Danny, I don’t know who else to call but Ethan’s gone and I”, he rambles, panic evident at the supernatural speed he’s spewing out syllables at, but sharing the news makes his anguish rocket. “He just disintegrated like he was made of dust. And he looked like he knew what…”

A weird click interrupts his rant. And then his oldest friend’s voice, happy and comforting and a little bit douchey, takes over.

“Hey, you’ve reached Danny. You know me…”, the voice singsongs. “If I don’t pick up, then I’m dead so… don’t bother leaving a message. For real. Just don’t.”

The phone barely bounces back as it hits the floor.

 

_Davis – 10:55 p.m. (PST)_

“Mom, it’s Scott”, Scott struggles to get out when his mother picks up.

Malia and he took a couple of minutes to detail their action plan after Stiles’ call. But both their phones had kept on blowing up with texts and notifications about more disappearances and people turning into dust. The whole world was crying in fear and grief and it eventually jumped them into action.

“Scott”, his mother acknowledges, and he can hear all her love and affection and pride pouring through the line with a single word. The feeling brings tears to his eyes.

“Where are you?”, he queries. “Is Chris with you?”

“We’re both okay”, she replies instead of answering his questions. They both understand where his mind is at. She speaks again, rushed, and Scott holds the breath he had only started to release.

“Listen, Scott. I want you to know that I love you. That I love you and that I believe in you. And that I know you will fight this. And you will win. You hear me, Scott? You will win”, she states with a certainty and faith in him that unsettles him to his core.

“This Scott?”, he hears in the background. The sound of shuffling hurts his oversensitive tympanic membrane, but he holds on. “Scott, you need to go New York, do you hear me? Start there”, Chris pipes up. “New York. City. Okay, Scott? You need to g…”

The sentence abruptly ends. The awful noise of a phone crashing against the floor rings in the sudden silence.

“Chris? Chris? Are you here?”, Scott asks, frantic. His high school sweetheart’s dad had grown on him, but he had not expected to feel this lost and aggravated without his reassuring presence.

“Oh my God”, he wails. “Mom? Mom? Please tell me you are still here? Please pick up the phone. Pick up the phone and tell me you are still here! Mom…? Mom?”, he sniffs, uncapable of stopping.

“Mom…?”

But there’s only silence.

 

_Lyon – 7:57 a.m. (CET)_

Isaac Lahey adjusts his scarf around his neck before entering the amphitheater. He discreetly takes his seat at the very last row. He has made a couple of friends over the two years he stayed, but he is a lot more comfortable keeping a low profile these days. He takes out his notebook and pen out of his messenger bag.

He notices the anomaly when he sets his materials on his table and does not hear the quiet tap which usually comes with the pad of his finger hitting the wood. Curious but not yet deranged, he observes the missing knuckles on his right hand. Minuscule patches of his skin thin and stretch and eventually detach themselves from his arm, dust blown by the draft. Looking around, he notices other students similarly affected: some share his scientific wonder, some quiver in fear, some cry. He looks at the other young adults then, the ones who are seemingly fine. Isaac recognizes the distress and sadness on their faces. He has seen them in the mirror every single day for months now.

“Oh”, he thinks. Nothing else comes to his mind. No agitation. No apprehension. No regrets.

He disappears slowly and inexorably. As he continues to watch his body disintegrate with mild interest, Isaac mutters to himself.

« Tu avais raison, Ally, ça ne fait pas mal. Plus mal. Du tout. »

_Davis – 10:59 p.m. (PST)_

Malia Tate growls in frustration at the sight of her mate, crouched on the floor, tears streaming his usually so-hopeful face.

“Scott, Scott, please hear me!”, she tries again, a permanent echo to his own endless repetition of “Mom… ? Mom… ? Mom… ?”.

The were-coyote considers herself lucky. She does not care about a lot of people. And the people she holds in her heart are okay. Devastated but okay. In spite of her relatively good fortune, she still wishes she could do something to help Scott, a small selfish part of her terrified at the idea that she might not be what he needs. She has to do something. There’s got to be something to stop this nightmare.

The doorbell rings. Malia walks to the door, thinking that she can at least hold down the metaphorical fort… On Scott’s and her doormat stands a very proud, very out-of-breath Peter Hale. His cheeks and neck red with exertion, he pants loudly. He swipes sweaty hands against his jeans, but his blue eyes never leave hers. She flashes her own supernatural irises in response without volition.

“You’re here”, she finally says after taking him in.

“Yes”, he off-comments, far too proud for the sorry state he appeared in. “And you are here as well.”

They remain silent, face-to-face, father and daughter, equally bad at communicating their true feelings.

“Good”, the ex-Alpha adds, almost like an afterthought.

His eyelids close then and he lets his head fall backwards. The girl barely has the time to avert her eyes before the werewolf dissolves completely. She doesn’t know how long she stands at the door in front of a now empty stair case. Malia closes the door.

“Who was it?”, Scott sniffles from his spot on their carpet.

“It was Peter”, she tells him matter-of-factly. “It’s no one now.”

Her mate gets up then, all but runs to hold her. The beta escapes his embrace, refuses his comfort.

“I’m calling Derek”, she informs.

Malia considers herself lucky. She shouldn’t have.

 

_New Mexico – 12:00 a.m. (MST)_

A graceful silhouette stands up on the silvery sand desert. Defying the moon with a steely look in her eyes, she coils her new sword around her forearm with a flick of her wrist. The thunder kitsune spares a glance at the footprints of the three Skinwalkers who were encircling her a second prior. Soon their dusts will mingle with the sand; the wind blows will erase the last traces of their existence.

The swordfighter tightens her hold on the four feather-shaped black items. One by one, she plucks her tails in her belt around her waist, then carefully covers them with her shirt. She gives the full moon a withering look.

Then, Kira Yukimura starts walking.

 

_Cambridge – 02:01 a.m. (EST)_

As she attempts once more to tune out the surrounding noises of confusion and scare to reach out to her banshee senses, Lydia Martin hears a knock on her room’s door. A curt, single, knock, Stiles’ way of letting her know he is on her doormat. He has always been on her doormat. Slowly, carefully, she gets up and crosses the room. Every movement, every sound, every word feels dangerous. One wrong action could set the curse up, trigger her disappearance. Now that Stiles has arrived, she badly needs to see his face.

Behind her door, her boyfriend’s head hangs low. But he doesn’t cry. The Nogitsune has bled him out of his tears. She warily pulls him in her studio, then in her embrace, and waits until he is ready to share his mind.

“They’re all gone”, he sentences, no inflection in his tone. And Lydia refrains a shiver: the last time he had sounded this emotionless, the boy she loved had killed her best friend. And her boyfriend. “All gone. I called him on his cell. I called him at home. I called his deputy. I had to call the station… My dad’s gone. And Parrish is gone. I’m … orphaned”, Stiles concludes.

He breaks down, then. And the strawberry blonde girl lets him weep in her hair and kneels down to accompany his fall. “I know, Stiles, I know. I tried to tell you…”, she murmurs while she trusts it won’t help.

“I drove as fast as I could”, the human argues, his turmoil pushed back in a second. The banshee always secretly admired him for that inner strength. “I called while speeding”, he spits. “Since the police force is MIA, what the hell, right?”.

“Don’t do that”, Lydia consoles him. “I’m here for you. And there might be hope, we…”

Her phone rings then.  She picks up on speaker without a second look. Time for niceties has come and passed.

“Lyds?”, Jackson asks.

“Jax?”, Lydia echoes.

“Stiles”, Stiles chimes in.

“WHAT THE FUCK HAVE YOU DONE THIS TIME, STILINSKI?”

“I’ll have you know, asshole, that…”

“Quiet!”, Lydia shouts. She pauses a millisecond then, fear overtaking her nerves; her limbs all contract at the same time and air appears to solidify in her trachea. She fights back her fright: if Stiles can do it, then so can she. And apparently it is not yet her time to go. “I am sorry about Ethan, Jax. But listen, I still have visions. It means there is still something we can do.”

She expects an onslaught of questions, but her revelations are met with stubborn silence, her ex and her boyfriend both too weary and aggrieved to put their faith in her. She sighs but cheers on.

“I cannot make sense of what I see just yet. It looks like New York, but it isn’t exactly... I think whatever is happening finds it source in another dimension”, the MIT student explains.

“Makes perfect sense”, the kanima snickers.

“What do you need?”, Stiles questions instead.

“Glad you asked”, Lydia replies, the fondness in her tone emphasizing the truth in her words. She indeed feels incredibly relieved to witness Stiles back on track and on the matter at hands. “We need to start with someone who has knowledge about other dimensions, someone who has crossed dimensions… someone who has made it back. 

“That could either be Scott in my mind, me with the Wild Hunt, or…”, Stiles enumerates.

“We need Theo.”

 

_Beacon Hills – 11:03 p.m. (PST)_

“Please, Theo”, Liam Dunbar calls from the doorway of his living-room. “Hurry back! These two won’t stop making out.”

The beta werewolf sticks out his tongue at his two best friends. From their place on the couch, Mason flips him, but Corey, too engrossed in their kiss, barely acknowledges him.  

“Have Nolan threaten them then!”, Theo shouts back from the kitchen.

Liam glances at Nolan who has, as usual, picked the farthest chair in the corner. Their newest friend furiously shakes his head, desperate to make it clear that he would never be a menace to anyone.

“Yeah, not sure it will work”, Liam mutters to himself as he takes the sight around him. A contented rumble emanates from his chest. Before his Alpha left for UC Davis, Scott has tried to explain to his first beta the uniqueness of the feeling of being surrounded by Pack. The younger werewolf did not completely understand it then, only used to run away for his life. But he does it now that the Wild Hunt is gone and that they have all had some peace and quiet to move on with their lives. Now that they have had time to build.

“Should I brink soda as well?”, Theo asks.

A belated chorus of “yes” answers him. Mason and Corey found their place quite easily within Liam’s Puppy Pack, almost like they have been there from the start. Theo is a little bit more of a surprise. They all thought he had left Beacon Hills with the Wild Hunt. He never did. Somewhat thankful to Liam’s getting him out of his personal Hell, he had stuck around, waiting. For a second chance, maybe. To belong, perhaps. Liam has not yet figured it out. But he still invites Theo to Pack outings. First and foremost, and he will never admit it out loud, because it pleases his wolf. Second, because he would rather keep an eye on the mischievous chimera. And third, because Liam is also waiting…

“Only if Nolan beats them up!”, Theo bargains as the beta hears him stomp back from the kitchen.

Nolan sort of happened in their lives, like he was not there one day and suddenly became a permanent fixture, discrete, sincere, always a shy smile and soft word on his lips. Theo has instantly taken to tease him mercilessly to bring him out of his shell.

A buzz in Liam’s pocket puts an abrupt end to his thoughts. Liam’s grin widens as he fishes his phone and reads his Alpha’s name on the screen.

“Hey, Scott”, the beta greets amicably.

“Liam!”, Scott all but shouts; the knowledge that something terrible has happened falls like a ton of bricks on the werewolf’s shoulders. “Are you okay? Are you all okay? Do you know where Theo is?”

The brunet has no idea of the situation but the True Alpha’s concern and worry and raw pain communicates through the line. He whines. His fight or flight instincts suddenly permeate the room. The two lovers on the couch stop eating each other’s faces.

“Yes, we’re fine. Scott, what’s going on?”, he presses.

A hiccup on his right splits his focus. He turns his head and meets Nolan’s terrified eyes. The human’s mouth is stretched open in a silent cry of horror. Time seems to stop. And Liam watches powerless as what was once Nolan slowly degrades into a cloud of dust. Unable to comprehend what he has witnessed, the beta doesn’t bulge. His eyes blink and his nostrils flare and his fingers flex, all trying to get clues and reasons to explain the event. His mind is blank.

“What?”, Mason shrieks.

“What the hell, Scott?”, Liam croaks on the phone. “Nolan just … vanished!”

“I don’t know… People have been disappearing”, Scott whispers.

Liam’s anger melts. His Alpha’s voice sounds broken, as if he can barely chain words. He has never seen Scott so dismayed. Lost. He has never been this scared in his entire life.

“Oh, really?”, Mason pipes up. Liam just has the time to turn in his direction to catch his best friend rolling his eyes with annoyance. He is gone the next second. The beta feels like he has been punched in the gut. His vision blurs.

“Mase…”, Corey laments, and just like that, the sweet boy with sad puppy eyes has disintegrated too.

“Mason! Corey!”, Liam shouts, his phone forgotten.

“Shit…”, Scott’s voice conveys in his hand. “Liam, Theo can help, okay? We need you to get to Theo. Do you know where…”

“Little Wolf”, Theo gently calls from behind him. The beta turns away from the empty living-room. He searches the chimera’s eyes, hoping for a solution, an explanation, or even just comfort…

What he finds there, however, he could have never expected. His former enemy wears on his face an expression Liam has never seen him direct towards anyone in his life. Softness, tenderness, blazing affection fill Theo’s blue eyes. An accepting smile fights his way at the corners of his lips. 

“Are those for me?”, the artificial supernatural creature wonders aloud. Liam swipes the traitorous tear away from his cheek.

They both look at the chimera’s rapidly dissolving hand, then. Theo even goes to prod it with his other limb. He slowly looks back up. He twitches when he discovers Liam’s gleaming eyes and his fangs protruding from his mouth.

Theo glances at his own heart, then beams: “It’s not too bad, I guess.”

The rest of his shape disintegrates. Liam glares at the dust settle on the carpet.

“Wh-what?”, he gets out around pointy teeth. “Theo”, he whispers.

At the end of his arm, Scott’s tone is urgent and pressing, begging to be told Theo’s whereabouts. Liam shuffles in circles, offering wide-eyes at his now dead silent home.

“I… I…”

Grief simmers in the depth of his mind. It pushes up and up like a storm ready to destroy everything in its path as soon as thunder marks the start. The lump in his throat becomes so big he feels he cannot swallow nor talk and he lets the teardrops run their course freely on his cheeks.

Far far away, Scott continues to plead but Liam only offers his arrhythmic breathing as an answer. He shakes his head, waiting for his despair and rage to engulf him completely. The hurricane tears through his heart with unprecedented violence…

 

_It starts with a scream…_

**Author's Note:**

> I've made a mess... Someone else fix it? ('Cause I sure as hell won't.)  
> \--  
> Details on potential triggers:  
> Outside of the grief many characters go through at the loss of their loved ones (some actually watch them disappear in front of them), one character implicitly suffers from depression and does not care about his own death; another character has lived some traumatic experience and does not react at all upon witnessing others' death. There's no gore at all in this work.  
> \--  
> Scream at me on Tumblr (shatteeran.tumblr.com)


End file.
